Chinese public health officials are trying to discourage residents from joining the latest craze in weight loss: swallowing eggs of Ascaris worms – giant intestinal roundworms to literally eat away your fat. It is the inverse of Weight Watchers: rather than giving dieters meals, the dieters are the meals.

Infection can occur naturally through ingestion of food contaminated with feces. It appears that someone liked the way they looked after such an attack.

Ascaris worms can grow up to 15in in length in your intestine and lay up to 200,000 more eggs a day inside the body. They cause abdominal pain and distension, vomiting, diarrhea and malnutrition . . . and death in some cases. It may also take surgery to remove the worm. However, those jeans may finally fit.

The worms are the rage among the dieting set in Hong Kong where health officials are also trying to discourage the use of flammable paraffin wraps to literally burn off belly fat.

It is pretty easy to see the negligence case here and the product design defect claim. But how about ultrahazardous activity liability and animal liability under strict liability? The problem is of course assumption of the risk, though the actual risk may not be fully known to the worm eaters.